Oak Bay Police are reminding residents that the wild animals may forcefully and aggressively defend their young against perceived threats. The best way to avoid human-wildlife conflicts with deer is to stay a safe distance away. (Keri Coles/Oak Bay News)

Herd of deer attack B.C. woman

This isn’t the first time deer attacks have frightened residents in the province

On Monday, police in Victoria received a report from a woman that had been attacked by a herd of deer in her own backyard.

The woman heard a commotion in her backyard and went outside to investigate. She saw several deer in her yard and opened the gate to let them out. The deer ran toward her, possibly seeing her as a threat to the young fawn that had run out of the yard.

The deer knocked the resident over and stomped on her causing her minor injuries, according to police. This encounter comes on the heels of a series of similar occurrences in Victoria and beyond.

On Friday, Aug. 31. a Comox woman was pinned to the ground after she discovered a male deer entangled in her backyard fence. She approached the large buck to offer assistance and he turned on her, knocked her to the ground and wouldn’t let her get up.

Comox Valley RCMP responded to the site and grabbed onto the deer and were able to free the woman so she could walk to a waiting ambulance. The BC Conservation Service attended, sedated the deer and untangled him. The woman had some relatively minor injuries.

Earlier this summer, a woman in Penticton was twice stalked by aggressive deer while out walking her dog.

“I heard a noise behind us, turned to find a deer trotting up behind us. She stopped about five feet away from us,” said O’Fallon. “We started running home and thankfully, when I looked, she hadn’t followed us.”

The next day it happened again, and this time Bucky, her 13-year-old lab/husky cross, was injured.

“She came right up to me, three feet from me, if that. I was yelling and screaming at her but she wouldn’t budge,” said O’Fallon. “She put her head down and ran around me, struck my dog with her front hooves, jumped over him and turned to charge at him/me again.”

Another early summer attack left one Saanich resident shaken when, on June 4, she was walking her dog on the 3700 block of Aiden Drive when a group of grumpy deer chased her and her dog around a parked car.